In 2019, Mozambique faced one of its most devastating disasters in recent memory when Cyclones Idai and Kenneth struck the country within weeks of each other.  The storms affected more than 1.7 million people and caused an estimated $3 billion in damages and losses.

Among the hardest hit were those who lost their homes. Nearly 300,000 houses were damaged or destroyed, displacing more than 250,000 people. This massive upheaval not only exposed the country’s vulnerability, but also served as a wake-up call about the need to make the country’s housing stock more resilient to future disasters. 

It is against this backdrop that the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR) and the World Bank have partnered with the Government of Mozambique to support the country in building homes back better.   This support has been provided under the auspices of the $210 million Cyclone Idai & Kenneth Emergency Recovery and Resilience Project (CERRP) and with assistance from the Japan-World Bank Program for Mainstreaming Disaster Risk Management in Developing Countries.

A key focus of the support was to adapt emerging best practices in resilient housing into a detailed housing reconstruction manual tailored for Mozambique.  As the first of its kind in the country,  the manual provided concrete guidance for housing planners and builders on how to  embed resilience into reconstruction, taking into account different damage levels, property ownership, and feasibility of risk reduction measures.

The manual has been used by national and international NGOs as well as the International Organization for Migration (IOM) to complete the resilient retrofitting of 4,300 homes —3,400 of which belonged to female-headed households. To implement the work, more than 2,700 local artisans were trained and certified by UN Habitat, then hired by the NGOs and IOM. In addition, 53,000 community members, including over 16,000 women, were trained in resilient recovery practices informed by the manual.

GFDRR also supported the development of analytical work to help the government better understand what it will take to ensure that resilient housing practices can be more widely adopted over the long-term – even beyond the government’s reconstruction efforts after Cyclones Idai and Kenneth.

For instance, support was provided for an assessment of how cyclones Kenneth and Idai prompted behavioral shifts among local communities in Beira toward better preparedness against future cyclones. The assessment did find that challenges remain when it comes to ensuring uptake of resilient housing practices, including a lack of awareness and limited financing options. Nonetheless, the assessment also highlighted progress, with the support of both national and local authorities. For example, the study found that locally constructed functional drainage systems significantly mitigated housing damage in Beira following the cyclones.

The assessment also underscored that building resilient communities will require interventions that go beyond resilient housing. For instance, it emphasized the importance of early warning systems, which can help the residents to take proactive measures to safeguard their homes from disasters.

GFDRR and World Bank support for resilient housing is only one part of a much broader, transformative partnership with Mozambique spanning a range of thematic areas including nature-based solutions, resilient infrastructure, safer schools, and emergency preparedness and response. For example, previous support paved the way for the resilient rehabilitation of 1,100 classrooms across Mozambique, benefiting more than 132,000 children in the country.

Insights from GFDRR and World Bank support for Mozambique are beginning to inform resilience-building efforts in the country and across the region. In April 2025, government officials from Mozambique and Malawi attended a technical workshop in Maputo to discuss lessons learned from over a decade of GFDRR and World Bank engagement in resilient rehabilitation of education and health infrastructure.  The workshop, organized in partnership with UN-Habitat, also included participation from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).